March 11--A man with the last name of Dollar has been charged with robbing a North Center neighborhood bank of almost $2,000 Tuesday morning, authorities said.
Larry Dollar, 43, appeared before a U.S. magistrate judge Wednesday morning and was ordered held until his next hearing on March 17, following the robbery a little after 10 a.m. Tuesday of an MB Financial Bank branch at 3940 N. Damen Ave., according to an FBI news release.
A man went into the bank, took a cup of free coffee and left the bank. He then came back soon after, according to the complaint against him. On his return visit, Dollar went up to a teller and mumbled something the teller couldn't hear. When she asked him if she could help him, he demanded money and told the teller he had a gun, according to the complaint.
"Give me $10,000, I have a gun," the robber told the teller, according to the complaint. "Don't move. Give me $10,000."
The teller gave the man $1,960, including what's known as "bait bills," which have their serial numbers recorded by a bank, according to the complaint. The man ran south on Damen Avenue, and police who recognized him as fitting the description of the robber stopped Dollar a few minutes later near Grace Street and Lincoln Avenue.
Dollar had his jacket turned inside out and had a large amount of cash, including the bait bills, in his pocket. Investigators said his description matched photographs taken of the robber in the bank.
Dollar, of the 4500 block of North Hazel Street in the Uptown neighborhood, could face up to 20 years in prison if convicted of bank robbery.
An earlier version of this story gave an incorrect direction for the robber's direction of flight.
